Petfre (Gibraltar) Limited, the operator of online betting platform Betfred.com, has been hit with a £240,000 fine by the UK’s Gambling Commission (UKGC) after some of its online slot games were found to have breached industry standards.
The penalty was imposed after a selection of online slot games featured on Betfred Casino and the operator’s now defunct brand, oddsking.com, failed to display a customer’s net position during a session of play.
Others were found to celebrate wins involving rewards that were actually less than a player’s original stake.
Both of these scenarios were deemed to be in breach of the UKGC’s regulatory standards.
UKGC Ruling Against Petfre
The UKGC’s concern was that audio or visual celebratory sequences may affect a player’s ability to interpret their gameplay accurately if they are actually in an overall losing position.
As a basic example, if a player laid a stake of £1 and their return was only 20p, the games would still mark the ‘win’ with a celebration despite the fact there had been a net 80p loss.
As a result, the games had failed to meet the Remote Technical Standards (RTS) required and the UKGC issued a £240,000 fine for Petfre (Gibraltar) Limited following its regulatory finding.
Petfre swiftly decommissioned all offending titles from its brands portfolios.
The operator is responsible for Betfred Casino, Betfred’s online sportsbook and its betting shops, while its OddsKing offering ceased trading in 2023.
The Betfred operator has been in hot water with the UKGC previously.
In September 2022, Petfre (Gibraltar) Ltd trading as Betfred and OddsKing was fined £2.9 million for failures within its social responsibility and money laundering standards.
Legislation Behind The Latest Ruling
There were two specific RTS stipulations that Betfred and OddsKing had failed to adhere too while running the offending online slot games.
RTS 2 (Displaying Transactions) of the Commission’s remote gambling and software standards was last updated in January of this year.
Requirement 2E states: “All gaming sessions must clearly display a customer’s net position, in the currency of their account or product (for example, pounds sterling, dollar, Euro) since the session started.
“Net position is defined as the total of all winnings minus the sum of all losses since the start of the session.”
RTS 14 (Responsible Product Design) was last updated in February 2025.
Requirement 14F states: “The gambling system must not celebrate a return which is less than or equal to the total stake gambled.
“By ‘celebrate’ we mean the use of auditory or visual effects that are associated with a win are not permitted for returns which are less than or equal to last total amount staked.”
Executive Summary Of The UKGC’s Findings
John Pierce, Commission Director of Enforcement at UKGC, said: “Features that impair a consumer’s ability to make informed decisions are not appropriate and pose a clear risk.
“While we acknowledge the operator acted swiftly to remove the affected games, this enforcement action should serve as a clear signal to the wider industry to review and strengthen their compliance practices — and to ensure that gameplay is fair and consumers are not exposed to unnecessary risk.”
